Neonates and loud adults
Today’s afternoon trip was very pleasant – the weather was fairly nice, and the water was calm. #060 (Kanzashinko) stopped by for a visit with her neoante. (pictured above) She brought her neonate close to the camera on several occasions, and oddly enough, the neonate was not too bothered by all the fuss. Perhaps she has inherited her mother’s fearless nature.
In another entry, we came across some dolphins engaged in some strange social behavior.
You may recall from The Dolphin Pod episode titled “Herman’s Dolphin Prodigies” that dolphins have proven themselves to be capable of understanding the human pointing gesture. Dr. Louis Herman and his research team have shown that dolphins, when given a pointing arm and finger gesture to indicate an object, understand that this gesture is a cue to the location of an object. This might sound like a very boring, elementary skill, but the ability to follow a pointing gesture is very rare in the animal kingdom.
This morning we did the phone link to the aquarium. It was a quiet audience but Kristy asked a lot of questions, so we got to share some stories about our trip. Then we checked in at the phone company about getting a phone installed in the new apartment. In typical island fashion, the credit card machine isn’t working, so we will have to wait for it to be fixed to get our telephone. The boat left at 1500 and started the day with a murky snorkel stop at Atlantis.
A rainy day
June is usually a rainy month here on Mikura, and yesterday was a fine example of the kind of weather I can expect in the coming weeks. We ran across rainy patches all around the island. We had a few standard water entries, but the highlight of the trip was the last encounter. We observed a large group of adult and subadult males and females engaged in some energetic social activity.
Today the clouds finally broke up, but the wind persisted which cancelled the boat trip… or so we thought! After leaving the marina and heading to the beach, we were tracked down by some of the Bimini Undersea staff to tell us that the wind had died down and we would be going out. We rushed back to the dock and left for an afternoon of searching for the dolphins. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to see any dolphins, but Maria got to learn how to use the GPS and track our positioning.
Calm waters and no dolphins
I had two boat trips today. The morning trip was a bust – I recorded only 3 minutes of video in 2 hours! The dolphins were out there swimming around us and spent some time riding the bow of our boat. But as soon as we jumped in ther water, they disappeared. I think they just get fed up with playing with the passengers sometimes and choose to ignore us. They always seem to enjoy the boats however. The afternoon trip was a bit more productive.
Well, we spent the last two days drenched. Thank you Tropical Storm Barry! At least we didn’t have dangerous weather conditions, but it was enough to keep us off the boat yesterday & today. And, since we had various errands to attend to, it did mean that we spent lots of quality time with our rain coats. While in the house, Maria got her introduction to the photo-ID catalog, general points of the two species here, the Aquarium’s Dolphin Highlights program and video logging.
Dolphins are silly
I had a nice boat trip today – nice conditions, not too cold (finally). We ran across quite a few groups. In one rather amusing scene, #161 (Koshakure) – the one with the huge underbite – swam by me with an ENORMOUS fish in her mouth. It must have been 1 meter long or more. I am not sure what she was planning to do with it – there is no way she could swallow it without first tearing off chunks.
Another young dolphin arrives in this world IMAGE: boats at the pier
I am not sure if I am just getting old, or if the weather out here seems much colder and harsher than I remember. In my mind, I picture Mikura as a warm, humid, almost tropical island filled with sun, sandals and t-shirts. Perhaps my advanced years (early 30s) are bringing with them a touch of senility.
I’d like to introduce you all to Maria Baetti, DCP’s newest intern! You can read about this year’s interns in the May Dolphin Gazette. Interns will be spending approximately 3 weeks here in Bimini and approximately 6 weeks at the DCP office in Connecticut. We’re all looking forward to it! So, Maria & I met in the Ft.
